Liberals’ Spirits waste keeps on piling up

While Spirit of Tasmania V sailed out of Hobart this morning, the tab left for Tasmanian taxpayers to berth the dormant ships keeps growing. 

Tasmanians have now spent more than $22 million parking the ships in Scotland, Victoria and Hobart while the Liberals build the forgotten berth in Devonport.

Worryingly the waste doesn’t stop there, with close to $6 million more to be spent berthing the ships in Victoria until they are in service. 

That’s an astonishing $28 million on berthing costs, on top of the $717 million in cost overruns for the project which saw the Liberals announce a half a billion-dollar bailout in this year’s budget.

After 13 years of Liberal waste, Premier Rockliff has put Eric Abetz in charge of cutting jobs and services to pay for it. This is the biggest example of government waste this state has ever seen, and Tasmanians will continue to pay the price for generations to come.

Every dollar wasted on these ships due to the government’s mismanagement has been a dollar cut from services Tasmanians rely on.